Interior design ideas, landscaping and architecture

Designing
your own home is the perfect chance to be as creative as you like and
unleash your inner architect and interior designer skills. It’s a
actually a lot more technical than just choosing a theme or style for
your home or sticking with a color scheme. All the essential elements
of your home must compliment with one another, and not to mention,
must be flexible and open for possible redecorating in the future.
For those aspiring homeowners looking to live the dream, there are at
least 5 potential tips to consider when designing your own home.

1. Think
about an open plan for your home design

As you and
your designer begin playing around with where various rooms should be
located, consider how your final design will flow and how your family
might function in each space. For instance, to reduce noise in
sleeping areas, it’s wise to place bedrooms away from the communal areas of the house. Likewise, if you’re the
kind of family that tends to gather around the kitchen, an open floor
plan with easy flow between the living room, kitchen and dining
area will suit you well. This kind
of design also allows for excellent flow between rooms.

An open plan
house can also bring many benefits; light flows much easier
throughout the house and they generally look more aesthetically
pleasing. The modern trend for living spaces is to design houses with
a good compromise between the large open plan spaces you might want
and the intimate, cozy spaces you will almost certainly want for a
degree of privacy.

Large open
internal spaces, combined with flat walls and hard floors, increase
the internal reverberation of all noises created inside and outside
the home. You might want to design your open plan areas with a few
more walls and doors than you had originally planned.

2. Think
ahead and make sure you design your house for your family

Unless you
want to pay for some extensive renovations later on, make sure you
analyze the way you and your family live and ensure this is reflected
in the design of the home. Planning ahead will save you the worry and
budget issues in the future, and will even widen your creativity for
possible dual-purpose rooms and the flow of spaces.

Do you have
or plan on having children in the coming years? Do you have aging
parents? If so, you’ll need to think about accommodating close
family members in many different scenarios, such as accommodating
grandchildren and grandparents, taking care of elderly parents –
even accommodating extended family for holiday occasions. Likewise,
if you’re hoping to transition from an office job to operating your
own business out of your home, your home design should include an
office
area or flexible space.
Additionally, your kids are probably going to want to play outside,
so locate your outdoor play area next to the kitchen where you can
see them. You might also want to not have any stairs and a fence
around the property to begin with.

Basically,
when you think about the amenities in your home plan, you are
deciding what kind of family you’d like to become. Include features
your future self will find handy.

3.
Finding your room’s focal point

A
room's focal point is its most emphasized feature. It's the thing
your eyes are naturally drawn to when you walk into the room -- and
everything around the focal point compliments it.

If
you're lost with how to start decorating a room, finding its focal
point is a good start. Many rooms have built-in focal points: a
living
room
with a bricked backdrop, for example, or a kitchen
with an accented wall.

Once
you find the focal point, decorate around it. Use its main color in
elements throughout the rest of the room. You can also frame it. If
your focal point is a large window with a view, you might arrange
your furniture to frame it. If it's a large mirror or an interesting
piece of artwork, you might frame it with two smaller elements on
either side. The ideas are endless when it comes to decorating!

4.
Lighting is key when designing the rooms of your home

Lighting
could be a whole post in itself, but here's what you should consider
when you don't know much about it. First, learn the three basic types
of lighting:

Ambient:
It’s
also called general lighting, and its the overhead lighting meant to
evenly illuminate a room.

Task:
As
its name suggests, task lighting is meant to light a specific task.
A lamp in the living room might light a reading area. Under-cabinet
lights in a kitchen serve as task lights for countertops.

Accent:
Accent
lights are meant to highlight a particular object. You might see
them on painting, for example.

Adding
different types of lighting can give your room dimension. Start with
ambient lighting in each room, and then consider how you can use task
and accent lighting. Moreover, the best type of lighting for any room
in a house is natural light. Take advantage of the beauty of sunlight
in your area and install large
windows
for spaces like the living area and dining room, and skylights
for bedrooms.

5. Get
advice on construction techniques for your dream home

The final
trap people fall into regularly is not getting advice from experts in
the field. While you know what you want and shouldn’t stray too far
from your original plan, there will always be limitations and things
you can’t do. This is where you need advice and recommendations
from experienced professionals.

Designing
your own home can be very difficult and there will no doubt be many
people during the process that will have an influence on the final
product -- but you are the one who is going to live there, so keep
these influences in check and remain focused on your original plan.
Consider your budget, ideas and the scope of the project before
searching, and remember to ask a lot of questions.

For some
home owners, the dwelling and the land on which it stands is a major
asset, and for many it is their main asset. After all, your home is
probably going to be the single biggest investment you ever make. So
take your time, make sensible decisions, and design a realistic,
functional family home.